All Time Low
Dirty Work
Release Date: Jun 7, 2011
Genre(s): Pop/Rock, Alternative/Indie Rock, Alternative Pop/Rock, Emo-Pop
Record label: DGC / Geffen
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Album Review: Dirty Work by All Time Low
Very Good, Based on 4 Critics
Based on rating 5/5
On their fourth album, All Time Low get stranded between bratty snot-rock and witty power pop. Dirty Work — already a Top 10 hit — shows off the band's ability to weld slick harmonies to jackhammer chords, but it also sounds a little scattered. One minute ATL quote Ella Fitzgerald, the next they reference a more contemporary bard: "I think some dude just grabbed my junk/And now I know how Ke$ha must be feeling," Alex Gaskarth sings on "I Feel Like Dancin'." That song was co-penned by Rivers Cuomo, but the party jam here is "Time-Bomb," a tightly wound anthem that sounds like a real panic at the disco.
Based on rating B+
The pop-punk powerhouse quartet don’t go completely Green Day on their new fourth album, but they do inch toward something resembling maturity. On refreshingly poignant tunes like ”Guts” and ”Time-Bomb,” the sugary choruses sparkle so thoroughly that the yell-about-parents-and-girls moments don’t get in the way. Dirty Work proves you can grow up and still act like a kid — just as long as your songs are this head-rushingly catchy.
Based on rating 7/10
'Dirty Work' highlights what makes All Time Low such a draw... All Time Low’s music attracts a level of fandom beyond what they probably ever could’ve imagined – but for better or worse, they haven’t forgotten the key elements that define their sound. Musically, ‘Dirty Work’ highlights what makes them such a draw – from the onset of opener ‘Do You Want Me (Dead?)’ through to powerful closing track ‘Heroes’, it’s still super-catchy, but has enough of a rock edge to differentiate it from radio-friendly pop.
Based on rating 2.0/5
Review Summary: In many ways, Holly Madison is Dirty Work incarnate. It says a lot that in a year of unlikely and historic unions – AOL and Huffington Post, Her Majesty the Queen and Ireland, Osama Bin Laden and a bullet in his head – the most surprising and gruesome was an ex-Playboy mannequin’s whirlwind romance with All Time Low guitarist Jack Barakat. Less surprisingly, the relationship didn’t last, however Bakarat was nonetheless able to find time away from Hugh Hefner’s sloppy, sloppy seconds to record a fourth All Time Low record, Dirty Work.
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